Sometime during the night from Thursday to Friday, the load in the snowpack becomes too great. Almost at the top of the Steinberg - the freeride route from Titlis down to Trübsee - a huge avalanche breaks loose. Around 500 meters wide, the avalanche edge up to 4 meters high. And the force is enormous. The avalanche fillets all the snow from the glacier and leaves nothing behind but bare ice and rock. The huge masses of snow only come to a halt 700 meters further down.
The mountain is merciful
Two days earlier, the conditions in Steinberg are perfect. Finally this season! Fluffy powder, knee-deep, without stone contact all the way to Trübsee. The powder stress is correspondingly high. The terrain is teeming with freeriders satisfying their addiction to untracked snow. The mountain is merciful to them and to me - the avalanche happened during the night. Just one day earlier and there would have been a catastrophe. No probe would have been long enough, no airbag would have helped with these masses of snow.